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Sunday

A Família de Obama vai chego aqui no Brasil neste fim de semana. (transl. The Obama Family just arrived in Brazil this weekend.)

“ My mother is gone now, but she would’ve never imagined that her son’s first trip to Brazil would be as President of the United States,” Obama said. “And I never imagined that this country would be even more stunning than it was in the movie.”

President Obama is greatly admired in Brazil and has helped greatly with the image and status of the U.S. after some rough diplomatic years with former President Bush.

Obama: Brazil's democracy an example to Arab world

RIO DE JANEIRO – As U.S. warplanes pounded faraway Libya, President Barack Obama praised Brazil's transition from dictatorship to democracy as a model for the Arab world where decades of stability enforced by strongmen are giving way to an uncertain but potentially brighter future.

The president spoke from a theater in a historic Rio de Janeiro square where a 1984 protest set the stage for the eventual end of a 20-year military dictatorship.

He said those protesters showed how a popular revolt could produce a thriving democracy. And without specifically mentioning the military action he authorized just a day ago in Libya, the president drew a connection to the events there and throughout the Middle East.

"We've seen the people of Libya take a courageous stand against a regime determined to brutalize its own citizens. Across the region, we have seen young people rise up - a new generation demanding the right to determine their own future," the president said.

"From the beginning, we have made clear that the change they seek must be driven by their own people. But as two nations who have struggled over many generations to perfect our own democracies, the United States and Brazil know that the future of the Arab world will be determined by its people."

The events in Libya had threatened to overshadow Obama's three-country, five-day Latin American tour, so Obama sought on Sunday to use Brazil's own history to illuminate what's happening halfway around the world.

The president, speaking on day two of his trip, underscored that the people of Brazil determined the country's future, as he said must happen in the Middle East. It's a message Obama has conveyed ever since Tunisia's uprising in January set off a chain reaction through Egypt and to Libya.

With the U.S. now involved in military action to enforce an internationally authorized no-fly zone over Libya, Obama wants to be particularly clear to his audience back home that the U.S. will not write the final chapter in that country, or any other. He's insisted there will be no American ground troops in Libya.

"No one can say for certain how this change will end, but I do know that change is not something that we should fear," the president said.

"That is the example of Brazil. Brazil - a country that shows that a dictatorship can become a thriving democracy. Brazil - a country that shows democracy delivers both freedom and opportunity to its people. Brazil - a country that shows how a call for change that starts in the streets can transform a city, a country, and the world."

Brazil was ruled by a military dictatorship from 1964-85, a regime that was eased from power not by a sharp, violent revolution, but through a long, massive popular movement of peaceful protest and strikes led in large part by labor unions and dissident political groups.

Brazil is now enjoying one of the strongest democratic moments in its political history, and analysts have lauded the quality of its leadership during the last 16 years. New President Dilma Rousseff, the nation's first female leader, who took power in January, was a key member of a Marxist militant group that battled against the dictatorship.

Obama, who met Saturday with Rousseff, repeated that he hoped to strengthen ties between the two countries. Brazil large and vibrant economy stands out in the region.

While the speech was billed as an address to the people of Brazil, his audience was relatively small — about 1,800 fit in the ornate theater — many elegantly dressed. Judging by the number who listened without translator headphones, many spoke English.

CITY OF GOD FAVELA
Obama, who earlier Sunday visited a notorious Rio slum called City of God, made a direct pitch to the common bonds. He recalled how his mother's favorite movie was Black Orpheus, filmed in the shantytowns of Rio during Carnival. He cited the similar histories, two countries that emerged from a colonial past, grew through vast immigration and "eventually cleansed the stain of slavery from our land. "

He cheered Brazil's remarkable economic growth, but gently prodded Brazilians saying that such expansion also brings responsibility. And he called on Brazil to join the United States in demanding universal rights around the globe.

"These are not American or Brazilian ideas," he said. "They are not Western ideas. They are universal rights, and we must support them everywhere."

Obama is seeking improved relations with Brazil after a period marked by tensions and neglect, during which China overtook the United States as Brazil's main trade partner.

Based in a hotel in front of Rio's famed Copacabana beach, he will spend the day visiting a vibrant metropolis that encapsulates what he called Brazil's "extraordinary" rise as a global power in recent years.

The White House has justified Obama's five-day Latin American tour in large part for its potential dividends of boosting U.S. exports to help create American jobs, also considered crucial to his 2012 re-election chances.

His talks on Saturday with Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff focused heavily on strengthening economic ties with Latin America's economic powerhouse, though little progress was made on key disputes.
Conservative critics may seize the opportunity to chide Obama for being away from Washington -- and in a city renowned for its pristine beaches -- at a time when he is putting U.S. forces in harm's way.

Republican foes have accused him of a failure of leadership in a string of international crises.
But in keeping with his "no-drama Obama" image, the White House wants to avoid any sense the U.S. president is being held hostage by events or unable to tend to other crucial business.